More progress:

i5-lp4:[mixtec]$ openjdk-ecj/control/build/linux-ppc/j2sdk-image/jre/bin/java
Error occurred during initialization of VM
java.lang.StackOverflowError
        at sun.misc.SoftCache.(SoftCache.java:160)
        at java.lang.Thread.(Thread.java:1521)

I’m not usually so happy to see exceptions!